Camping at Jannie Pienaar’s farm Raadzel, 104 km before Bloemfontein
Distance 164 +13127 = 13291
Average 15.9
Time’s 0910 h 16 mo
Total from Amsterdam 18691
Location S29.070341, E25.20616aa3885

It’s 21h24 and I’ve just started to write. Breakfast was tuna mayonnaise as we don’t have oats. Left 05h00 and thank heavens the road looked flat but South Africa is probably top of the list for bumpy and uneven tarred roads. By 7 am and 30 km ridden we were ready for our second breakfast. Mixed nuts, dried sausage dates and Powerade did the trick.

Both Peter and I curse and swear at the cats eyes that we ride over on the road shoulder, bouncing out of our seats. In my next life I’m coming back with a hammer and I’m going to smash them all to pieces. Stopped to take a picture of the Douglas (town) sign board which brought back memories of Peter and I riding all the way to Kimberley (twice!) to buy a diamond for my engagement ring … that was over 20 years ago.

Having ridden 100 km we  arrived in Kimberley at 12h30, got ice suckers from the Spar and chatted to a few locals. They couldn’t comprehend the distance we’ve ridden to date. Carried on to Checkers to stock up on a few things and polished off a litre of yoghurt before carrying on to shorten tomorrow’s ride. We were both pretty tired from yesterday’s 138 ride and started looking for a farm as the sun started setting.

It was Murphy’s law that we had to carry on for longer than our tired bodies could handle. At 164 km we finally came to the sign ‘Raadzel’ horse farm. After the dogs on the farm barked up a storm, a lady and her daughter came out, very suspicious of these two scruffy looking strangers. After explaining our plight of not wanting to wild camp, Miems said it would be ok to camp outside of the walled house …  we didn’t fancy sharing their garden with the rather vicious looking dog. Stefané brought us a bucket of hot water to wash in and mum, Miems gave Peter two Black Lable beers and me a Flying Fish cooler. She also gave us a packet of ice. We had left over food for supper, crept into our tent and within a short while both Peter and I were in lala land.

Night all xx

– The mighty Orange River, looking rather polluted. There’s a mining company close by … say no more

– Nice to see a ‘cat’ sanctuary

– I’m sure this plant is from the cactus family

– We’re still novices at this ‘selfie’ thing

– Left overs for supper and my Flying Fish cooler chilling in my mug with loads of ice